Brad explains that ‘The Dream’ was “meant to point out that the so-called ‘American Dream’ has relegated itself to the status of myth. Due to broken government, a greedy, unregulated banking system and a population that cannot accept the notion of living within its financial means, the dream of owning a home in a quiet, peaceful suburban America with the ideal white picket fence has become nearly impossible to attain.”

(click on the image above to see a larger version)

The follow up to this piece—‘De-Evolution’—embodies that same critique of the US in its decline both politically and ethically, but at the same time, it is an homage to the country’s underlying beauty and spirit. Working alongside DEDAR using their new ‘Amoire Libre’ line of fabrics, Brad created a chair that appears to be slowly melting, each piece created to capture the chair at critical moments of decomposition. However, the fabric remains unscathed, a reflection of how the US is “not perfect [but]… a nation that… is still a beautiful place, a country with beautiful ideas. Through all of its faults, its tensions, its brokenness, we learn to live within and among it all, and we make it home. We accept it despite all of its imperfections, not unlike the Japanese notion of wabi-sabi.”

If you didn’t quite pick up on it, the declining scale from one chair to the next was used deliberately by Brad as a subtle reference to the Russian nesting doll (Matryoshka) as a nod to Russia, where this exhibition debuts during Moscow Design Week from October 11-17, 2013.

Jaime Derringer, Founder + Executive Editor of Design Milk, is a Jersey girl living the laid back life in SoCal. She dreams of architectural jewelry, running more than 8 miles + having enough free time to enjoy some of her favorite things—running, reading, and drawing.